Happy Merriman – Happy was named such because every time that he was in a scrap with a ME 109 he would holler like mad for somebody to come and save him, yet he always seemed to shoot down the particular enemy aircraft chasing him at the time. For some unknown reason, Happy threw his mattress out of the Cottage window each time he shot down an enemy aircraft. Happy shot down five enemy aircraft in one day (I confirmed one of these for him as the port mainplane snapped on the ME 109) and he hollered the usual gutturalnesses all the way in getting each of them. He threw his mattress out the window five times that day, and the batman, who made up Hap’s bed, was as happy as Happy.
Roland Richardson – Good old Richie had been in the Flight longer than any other pilot and I figured, right then and there, that I would listen to this experienced fighter pilot and that I would wangle myself into his section. Later on, Richie was shot down over England and he managed to force land near Tunbridge Wells Hospital. He said that he knew he was going to have trouble getting down, so he tried to set his beat-up kite down near the best of medical help. The poor guy got down alright, but the mainplanes were caught between two trees on the Hospital estate and the fuselage came to an abrupt stop. Everybody wondered how in the blazes Richie got away with it. It shook him up for a number of weeks. (About two and a half years later, I was sitting in the mess at Rockcliffe, Ontario and who should quietly stand in front of my chair and not say a word? I looked up, and was emotionally stunned. Richie and I had much to talk about before he left for Winnipeg.)
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